‘Weight’ almost over for fitness center

Waverly couple plan to open facility in September

Greg Olson, golson@s24533.p831.sites.pressdns.com

Published
9:11 am CDT, Friday, July 21, 2017

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Waverly Fitness Center is scheduled to open in September in the former Waverly IGA grocery store building. The owners — Sandra (front) and Al Bailey — said the fitness center will “be a nice addition” to their bed and breakfast business, The State Street Inn. less

Waverly Fitness Center is scheduled to open in September in the former Waverly IGA grocery store building. The owners — Sandra (front) and Al Bailey — said the fitness center will “be a nice addition” ... more

‘Weight’ almost over for fitness center

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A Waverly couple want to make their neighbors physically fit — or to at least provide the means to do so.

Al and Sandra Bailey are making final preparations to open Waverly Fitness Center in the former Waverly IGA grocery store building.

The fitness center, which the Baileys plan to open in September, will feature a room with ellipticals, treadmills and exercise bikes and a weight room.

Plans call for another room to be used for aerobics, karate and taekwondo.

“Currently, we are not developing the whole building, but we have plans to use more of the space in the future,” Al Bailey said. “At some point, we hope to offer CrossFit training for local residents.”

The Baileys had been considering opening a fitness center for about five years.

“We looked for a building in which to open a fitness center, but we couldn’t find one in Waverly that fit our needs,” Al Bailey said.

In 2015, the Baileys bought the old Ridings Dry Goods store building on the south side of the Waverly square from Janice and Terry Lowder.

“At that time, we decided to devote our time and energy toward opening The State Street Inn [a bed and breakfast] in the old dry goods store,” Sandra Bailey said, “but we still talked about our plans to open a fitness center.”

They even considered putting a fitness room in their bed and breakfast, but Al Bailey said the building couldn’t accommodate it.

“We have guests who like to work out or run, so we thought a fitness center would be a nice addition to our bed and breakfast and for us and the community,” Al Bailey said.

He said his wife suggested opening the fitness center in the old grocery store building, which they had purchased for storage.

Waverly Fitness Center will be open from 4 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day. It will be a membership-only operation at first.

“The reason we are doing memberships only is to keep costs down for us and the customers,” Al Bailey said.

Members will pay a fee and be able to access the fitness center by way of a touchpad.

Greg Olson can be reached at 217-245-6121, ext. 1224, or on Twitter @JCNews_Greg.